La Belle et la Bete

Jean Cocteau’s achingly beautiful telling of the Beauty and the Beast fairytale stars his off-screen lover, the achingly beautiful Jean Marais as the beast and Josette Day as beauty. Re-released as part of the BFI’s ‘Gothic’ season, movie’s don’t come more ravishing than this. The BFI’s web page with screening locations is here.

Last Vegas

On the cusp of turning into OAP’s, Michael Douglas, Robert De Niro, Morgan Freeman and Kevin Kline revisit their youth in Las Vegas to celebrate bachelor Douglas finally getting married to his much younger girlfriend. Sounds like The Hangover with a bus pass. The official Universal website is here and you can book tickets/get screening locations from the home page. It even takes you direct to your nearest cinema – bonus!

Mandela: Long Walk To Freedom

This isn’t the first biopic of Nelson Mandela (for instance, Freeman played in him in the sports drama Invictus, 2009) but this has an added piquancy as Mandela passed away as the film was premiered in London a few weeks ago. Idris Elba grabs an opportunity for a unique headline role in mainstream cinema therefore to play the man from his youth, through his struggle to end Apartheid in South Africa and his latter days as the first black President of South Africa. Noemie Harris plays his controversial second wife Winnie. The film will be screened across almost all UK cinemas and the official website is here.

The Missing Picture

One man’s search for a photo of a war crime in Cambodia when the Khmer Rouge ruled becomes a quest for the nature of reality and representation in this Cannes Film Festival winning film with plasticine dolls as the characters. The official New Wave Films site is here; the film will show at key cities only.